Land And Holdings (A Boxed Set of Four Mail Order Bride Romances)

By Beth Overton

Mail Order Bride: Taking The Same Ride With Her Fiancé & A Trainload Of Odd Characters - A woman travels by train to meet her soon to be husband, not knowing that he’s at the opposite end of it traveling to pick her up. They have mixed up their dates and everything in between on this witty and satirical train journey, which is pure, biting, and uniquely quirky fun.

Mail Order Bride: His Mother’s Smothered Chicken - A woman comes from poverty and travels to a Kentucky plantation owner who still mourns the recent loss of his wife and mother. She sees that he’s become very thin from his grieving and one day, before she is to throw her first dinner party, she finds a treasure hidden in the kitchen which she believes will help him regain his interest in life.

Mail Order Bride: The Overweight Boston Woman & The Cowboy With A Checkered Past In Oklahoma - An overweight and accident-prone woman from Boston decides to make her way to Oklahoma, and to a tall cowboy with a checkered past. She doesn’t know that, and when she finds out, has almost decided to return to Boston when a few odd incidents drive any thought of returning home right out of her mind.

Mail Order Bride: The Boston Schoolteacher, The Cowboy Rancher In Kansas & The Stolen Cattle - A Boston schoolteacher heads to Kansas to meet her new mail ordered husband. Immediately starting off on the wrong foot, she finally does meet her man and from that point onwards, her life changes in a dramatic and unexpected way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Beth Overton
• Release date: Feb 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9781311119575

Beth Overton

Beth Overton lives in Northern California with her husband and three cats. Besides writing romances, she loves to read everything she can get her hands on, as well as cooking up gourmet delights for her entire family.

Book preview

Land And Holdings

(A Boxed Set of Four Mail Order Bride Romances)

By

Beth Overton

Copyright 2016 Quietly Blessed & Loved Press

Mail Order Bride: Taking The Same Ride With Her Fiancé & A Trainload Of Odd Characters

Mail Order Bride: His Mother’s Smothered Chicken

Mail Order Bride: The Overweight Boston Woman & The Cowboy With A Checkered Past In Oklahoma

Mail Order Bride: The Boston Schoolteacher, The Cowboy Rancher In Kansas & The Stolen Cattle

Mail Order Bride: Taking The Same Ride With Her Fiancé & A Trainload Of Odd Characters

Synopsis: Mail Order Bride: Taking The Same Ride With Her Fiancé & A Trainload Of Odd Characters - A woman travels by train to meet her soon to be husband, not knowing that he’s at the opposite end of it traveling to pick her up. They have mixed up their dates and everything in between on this witty and satirical train journey, which is pure, biting, and uniquely quirky fun.

Ella had boarded the train outside Kansas City. She expected to meet her future husband in Harmony. The Great Southwestern Line ran all the way to Texas, although it stared in Chicago. She was supposed to meet her husband-to-be at the small train station north of the city and continue on with him to Wichita.

She had met him through the matrimonial section of one of the local papers. He was a rancher outside the city of Wichita who needed a wife and her a widower in need of a husband. Ella had lost her husband in a mine collapse where they had lived near Centralia, Pennsylvania.

Her former husband had been a mining engineer who had gone down into the ground to inspect a truss holding up one of the new sections. He and twelve miners had never come back up when the mine collapsed. It wasn’t as bad as many other mining disasters in the coalfields, but it had cost her the only man she’d ever loved.

Her future husband, Levi Stolz, owned a prosperous ranch near the border with Omaha. It was 1875 and he had managed to avoid both the Recent Unpleasantness between the states and the county seat wars, which had plagued Kansas.

His wife had died from consumption two years ago, leaving him with a ranch to manage on his own. He had no children and desired to start a family. Ella had read as much as she could about life on the frontier and was looking forward to it. It sounded much nicer than the cramped towns around the coalfields and she was tired of spending the day walking up and down hills.

She had made her final boarding in Kansas City after getting out of the train to buy some food and prepare for the final part of the trip. She wore a plain day dress and had left her ill-fitting corset back in the luggage compartment. It was September and the weather was already heating up in the morning. She heard the whistle blow and made her way back to the train, giving her ticket to the conductor who nodded as he punched the ticket.

The train was one of the longer ones carrying passengers out west. It had twelve cars, including the locomotive, caboose and baggage car. The passengers had eight cars to themselves including privies. It was a new train, just recently built on the metal yards in New York. The trip west was a test of every part of this train as the company who built it was eager to see how it would endure the long trip to the west coast.

Service across the country by rail had only recently opened up and the railroad companies were eager to see how well it worked out. By the number of eager passengers she had seen on her journey, they were expecting a large return on the investment in money and steel.

Levi had boarded the train in Kansas City and had no clue his bride-to-be was on the same train. He had some business to attend in Kansas City and had taken the train up from Wichita to conclude it. His date was in error, as he didn’t expect her to arrive for another week. Levi’s plan was to return to the station next week and meet her at that time. Little did he realize but his bride was on the same train as he was.

He was a thin and hard man who had endured much in his thirty-five years on the planet. He had survived locust invasions, the war, and the death of his wife. All he wanted was a little peace and to be allowed to raise his cattle in the privacy of his farm. He’d made sure each cow was branded properly and registered at the county office. He entered the train and sat down on the first seat he could find and didn’t care who thought his clothes looked shabby. He carried nothing with him other than the money in his wallet and a two-shot derringer up his sleeve.

Any man who thought they could take Levi’s money with no resistance was in for a rude awakening.

Levi was riding in the passenger car directly behind the locomotive. He didn’t care where he sat and this seemed to be the most crowded car on the train. He didn’t know why, but most of the passengers preferred to sit away from the locomotive with its bell, whistle and constant smoke belching. The locomotive ran on coal with coated anything near it with a layer of soot. Levi hadn’t bothered to even look at the other cars, as he wanted to stay in the front.

In the rear of the train, Ella sat in the caboose. The caboose was normally used strictly for the rail employees, but she was short on funds and the rail road had allowed her to stay in the rear cabin car provided she did some cooking and cleaning for the crew on its way west. The railroad was trying to keep her presence a secret, as it did not want rumors circulating about women being employed on the train for the relief of the male employees.

The railroad was sick and tired of hearing stories about convenient rail wives. Her money had run short in Kansas City so when she transferred to the new line, she approached the crew about staying in the caboose.

However, this final part of the journey she didn’t have much to do. Ella had finished with her morning chores for the train employees and was sitting on one of the benches waiting for the train to start moving down the line. One of the conductors was looking at the train through the cupola on top of the caboose trying to decide if there was anything needed before they started their journey.

Once he had decided the train was safe, he climbed down and walked back through the train to tell the engineer it was okay to start the engine. They would proceed down the track until switching outside Wichita. Ella was eager for them to begin moving and to meet her new husband.

Next to her was a tray of baked fish. The crew in the caboose was very lucky and had purchased a large amount of river bass for dinner and kept it on ice. Ice was very expensive in the fall, with the icehouses running out of the river ice, which they had stored in the winter for refrigeration in the summer. It would be months before the weather became cold again and the water started freezing up. The crew planned to have all the fish consumed in the caboose by the time they reached the station due north of Wichita. Ella was glad, as she had no intention of cleaning all those bass.

It was close to noon when Levi noticed one of the passengers signal to another and stand up. There were a few nods and suddenly eight of the twenty-four passengers in the front car had stood up at the same time. One of them, a man wearing the white collar of an Anglican minister, walked to the center of the train and cleared his throat to make an announcement.

Ladies and gentlemen, he spoke, the train will proceed to Wichita as was originally planned. However, there has been a change in the cost of tickets. I’m afraid my associates and I will need all the valuables you have on your person. He opened up his bible, which had been hollowed out, and produced a revolver.

The passengers who had stood up with him, seven men and one woman, pulled out bags and began to hold them open in front of the other passengers. They all appeared to be white, with the exception of one man who was definitely black. None of the other passengers moved, thinking this was some kind of gag.

It appears, my brethren, he announced, more persuasion is needed to fund my ministry. He took the gun and fired through the roof.

The engineer and brakeman, who were riding up in the locomotive, failed to hear the gunshot due to the noise generated by the engine. The conductor was standing in the next car when he heard it. He crossed over to the front car to see what had caused the noise. He was an older man who had worked for the railroad all his life. He had worked on the train when it was used to transfer troops to the confederate boarder and remembered the train pulling up to a station when cannon fire could be heard in the distance. The conductor was versed on the sound a gun would make. This one appeared to be very close. He crossed over between the cars and opened the door.

Everyone was dumping out cash except Levi. He had worked hard for his money and no band of black-clad butternuts was going to get it away from him. One of the men in black approached him and demanded his wallet. Levi smiled and held it up in the air. It was an old leather wallet, which he had used for twenty years to hold his money. A chain dangled from one end.

You mean this one? He asked.

Hand it over, Homer, the man sneered.

Over my dead body, you son-of-a-bitch, Levi told him. He thought about reaching for the Derringer, but decided against it.

Obliged, the preacher said from the other side of the car and shot him directly in the hand.

Levi dropped the wallet, which was scooped up by one of the other robbers who then put it in his bag. Levi collapsed on the floor of the train, clutching his hand. Blood spurted out of it.

Inside the car the conductor saw a man dressed as a minister holding a pistol and waving it in the air. All around him, a group of people wearing black was holding open bags where the other passengers were pulling out wallets and dropping rings into them. It was very clear this was a robbery in progress. He saw one man, a rancher he’d met earlier named Levi Stolz, on the floor clutching his bleeding hand. The conductor held the door open just long enough to see what was going on and locked it behind him. Then the conductor politely strode to the back of the train.

It took him a few minutes to make his way to the caboose. He made his way into it where Ella was sitting quietly.

He shut the door behind him and asked if any crewmen were available. Ella pointed to one man who was looking out through the cupola. His name was Earl and he was wearing a pair of suspenders over his grey work shirt and pants. In one pocket a dirty rag hung out. The crewman looked down at the conductor. He was trying to see if anything had come loose from the undercarriage after a noise had caught his attention. Little did he know the noise was from the gunshots.

Is something wrong, Earl asked the conductor. I just heard a noise.

Somebody is robbing the train, the conductor told him. I just saw them in the front car. I locked the door to the next one, so they won’t be moving too fast to it. You need to get a signal the locomotive so they know what’s happening in the car right behind them.

Earl pulled on the whistle to let the engineer know he needed to send a message. Once he heard the locomotive whistle blow an acknowledgement, he began sending out a message to the engineer with a pair of flags. A few seconds later the whistle on the locomotive blew twice, letting him know they had it.

Anybody hurt up there? Earl asked him.

One of the passengers was shot in the hand, the conductor told him. Guy named Levi Stolz. I hope he’ll be okay.

Did you say Levi Stolz, Ella suddenly asked. Her blue eyes had opened wide when she heard the conductor say the name. She was silent while they were speaking, scared to say or ask anything. But then she heard the name of her future husband.

Yeah, the conductor replied. He’d not noticed her once he entered the caboose, but now he couldn’t avoid her. It was odd for an ordinary passenger to be back here with the crew. Fellow talked to me today when he boarded the train. He’s some rancher down near Wichita. Told me he was coming back next week to pick up his new bride at the station above the town. Strange, this will be the first time they’ve ever met. Guess he found her through one of those matrimonial ads in a paper.

Ella was horrified. This had to be her future husband. Somehow he or she had made an error with the train schedule and both of them were on the line heading from Kansas City to Wichita. She had to get to the front and see if he needed any help, bandits or not. Ella jumped up and started to walk toward the door of the caboose leading to the next car.

Where are you going, the conductor asked her.

To help Mt. Stolz, she said. That was my future husband who was shot in the hand!

What, are you crazy? he yelled as she opened the door. Those are some very bad people up in that front compartment. For God’s sake, don’t start a panic!

Ella crossed between the cars of the moving train and shut the door as she went into the next compartment. She saw the prairie speeding past as she made the crossing. Although the train wasn’t moving very fast, it still made the tall grass go by quickly. Once into the next compartment, she looked around at the group of people sitting on the benches.

The entire car was occupied by a group of women wearing white robes. They ranged in age from twenty to sixty and were of all races. It was a little bit of a shock to her, but she didn’t have time to stop and ask questions, it was important she get to the front car and find out if Levi was